I got together at Starbucks with John Alpay, the San Clemente executive who’s running on the Capistrano Unified Children First ticket to take the place of trial lawyer Mike Winsten if the latter is recalled this November. John’s lived in San Clemente about four years now, and has degrees in economics and law as well as an MBA. He was a little frazzled that morning after getting his daughter Autumn all ready for her first day of kindergarten, at the new dual immersion language program at Viejo Elementary in Mission Viejo. It seems like just yesterday she was born, he says. But then, when you think about it, our own first day of school doesn’t seem all that long ago either, we agreed. So it goes.

Wait – Viejo? Outside of the San Clemente area where John lives? Isn’t Alpay, a staunch supporter of Measure H, concerned that under that reform he wouldn’t be able to vote for the trustee representing the area in which Autumn’s attending elementary school? Not really. Like me, he sees this concern as a small quibble in comparison to the expanded democracy by-area voting would achieve, through more accountability and less campaign expense. And he agrees with what I’ve outlined elsewhere, that there are still numerous ways beside the simple vote that a parent can help elect a trustee in their kid’s school area, if they care that much.

Now you, dear reader, have to read through this whole thing if you want to get to the juicy details about the harassment, intimidation, and miscellaneous Mike Winsten madness!

Down to Brass Tacks.

OJ: I want to begin by asking you, John, why do you hate unions so much?

Alpay: (laughs) Well, hate’s a pretty strong word.

OJ: No, you hate them. I mean, you’ve rejected any endorsement or support from the unions, why is that?

Alpay: To start with, I haven’t rejected anything. I’ve merely declined the opportunity to seek their endorsement or support. My actions don’t suggest that I have anything against union members. In fact I support the teachers and the classified workers for their dedication and hard work

In a union, the members pay dues, a portion of which is diverted to political purposes, as determined by the union leadership. The political views of the leadership may not be consistent with that of the membership. Union members should be able to decide for themselves which political causes they want to support with their hard earned money. So if a union member makes a decision to make a contribution directly to my campaign, he has exercised his own free well and I welcome the support with open arms. Support from a union is artificial because somebody other than the worker who earned that money is making the decision. In addition, by not accepting union money, I will win the election without their support and therefore not feel beholden to them and will be free to make decisions I truly believe are in the best interests of the school district.

OJ: It seems to drive SOME Republicans crazy, that so many of the opponents of the current Board – which of course consists of GOP insiders with their strings pulled by other GOP insiders – that so many of their opponents are also Republicans. You especially they treat like some kind of Judas or Benedict Arnold. You sense that too?

Alpay: Well…I don’t think this whole thing is really a Republican or Democrat issue, this is a non-partisan issue, and a non-partisan position. Mike Winsten himself is a good example of that – up until two years ago, right before running for this board, he’d been a lifelong Democrat. So, whether you’re a Republican or Democrat, I think you need to look at the track record of the individual, and see what they’ve done, consider what they’ve said, and then make an informed decision based on the facts. With respect to Winsten, you need to ask if he’s acted in the best interests of his constituents. So, Republican, Democrat, or Decline to State, I’m seeing an across-the-board dissatisfaction with this trustee.

OJ: Do you feel that this Board, given that they are all insider Republicans, have betrayed any core Republican values?

Alpay: Well again, with respect to Mr. Winsten, I think you can legitimately call him a RINO – Republican In Name Only. He gets into office, talks about doing all these great things, for example giving local control to the voters, but then once he’s no longer on the outside, he supports actions that are designed to entrench himself in office for years to come. Take the voting-by-trustee-area issue for example, he came out and said he supported it, then once he gets in he realized “Hey this is great! Let’s not do it because then I can stay in office that much longer!”

OJ: Because a person has to raise so much money just to…

Alpay: It’s ridiculous! It’s a huge amount of money!

OJ: How much are you having to raise for this election?

Alpay: I need to raise as much as possible, quite frankly. Just look at the size of the district, its geography, its population, it’s just a huge barrier to overcome. In terms of me running for City Council two years ago, you know, San Clemente is a relatively large city, and it’s very expensive. There were two seats available and nine candidates. The top four finishers each spent more than $40,000. Can you imagine that in the context of a school district that much larger? That’s prohibitively expensive unless you’ve got the backing of special interests, or somebody with very deep pockets and presumably less than altruistic motives.

OJ: Yeah, I heard that while you were running for Council, or was it afterwards, you were proposing some kind of spending limits? Some hostile commenter brought that up here as though it was some huge strike against you, but I’m not sure ideas like that are unpopular at all; I think Americans are looking for a way to get big money out of politics, in spite of this latest Citizens United decision.

Alpay: Well, had written a proposed model ordinance that contained two components. One was term limits, and the other was campaign finance reform. Now, there was another individual in town who was advocating term limits as well, and the Council addressed that issue immediately prior to me discussing my ordinance. And the Council turned down term limits, so it just basically became Campaign Finance Reform. It was designed as a means to have turnover in the City Council, because what you had there were people who in one case had been there nearly twenty years. Well, that’s a very long time.

Alpay: If you look just at the aggregate population, the majority of people in Orange County do live in a municipality that has some kind of term limits. (Mostly it’s the smaller towns that don’t.) On top of that, our Board of Supervisors at the county level also live under term limits. So my thinking was it makes sense to try it in San Clemente, given that there were Councilmembers who had been there for multiple terms. And the average age was well north of sixty when I ran, and after the election, it was even older. That’s just not representative of a community where the average age is 37 years. Is that in the best interest of democracy? No, because there’s no turnover, and continued entrenched interests. It’s reminiscent of the Supreme Soviet back in its heyday.

Taxpayers, Children & Homeowners – oh my!

OJ: You’ve had a sort of slogan, where you would be representing three groups only: “taxpayers, children, and homeowners.” Well, children of course, we all love children. Talk about how you’d represent taxpayers, and how you would do that better than the incumbent.

Alpay: Well, again, Sacramento is decreasing the revenue to CUSD, so the only way they could effectively maintain a budget is by reducing costs. The only other option I can foresee is to raise taxes, and to me that’s not an option. I don’t support a parcel tax…

OJ: Not in this economy.

Alpay: No, it would be a huge disservice. So again the only option is to reduce costs outside the classroom. We see a huge number of attorneys on retainer by the District and I can not see any effort to reduce legal expenses. If anything, they have gone up.

There should be in-house counsel, for example, that could do all these cases much more cheaply, much more effectively, and if nothing else properly monitor the outside attorneys who are hired. If you go back and look at the news articles in the OC Register, there was a move to bring on in-house counsel prior to Winsten’s election. There was even talk, in these Scott Martindale articles, about how they had interviews ongoing for that position. Once Winsten assumes office, there’s only radio silence. There’s nothing in the press, nothing on the record, nothing to suggest any moving forward on that. The idea of hiring in-house counsel was quashed. Why is that? There’s a strong correlation to Winsten assuming office, Winsten who coincidentally is the only attorney – a trial attorney at that – serving on the Board.

OJ: Okay, back to what was that – taxpayers, children and homeowners. You were saying the current Board’s policies are impacting home values in the district?

Alpay: Well, you’ve got to remember that the quality of the schools is an important factor when buying a house, especially for young families. When I bought my first house, I was single and did not necessarily consider the quality of the local school district. It was something I thought about, but it was low on my list. When I was married and buying my first house with my wife, the quality of the local schools was at the top of our list, because any responsible parent is going to want the very best for their children.

Now, with the turmoil in CUSD, and this Board becoming a laughingstock and a figure of pity for many other school districts, young families won’t necessarily want to move into the area. We all know that real estate has taken a great hit in the last few years – yet why is it they’ve stabilized or even increased in Irvine first? It’s because the school district there is fundamentally sound and well operated. Home values have held up exceptionally well in Irvine, at least comparatively. We don’t have the same situation in the South County with CUSD, and so our home values have been impacted by this uncertainty given the school district, causing parents to question, “Where do I want my children to go to school?” The answer is a lot more young families are starting to choose Irvine, or other communities outside of CUSD. In fact, I had one friend who chose to buy a house in Rancho Santa Margarita, but intentionally chose a neighborhood that is served by Saddleback, not CUSD. That speaks volumes.

Photo provided courtesy of San Clemente Historical Society.

Let’s Have a Photo Contest!

OJ: Okay, I asked my hostile readers what questions I should ask you. One of them came up with that campaign finance reform thing which they thought was a bombshell, and one of them said I should ask you about some “photo contest.” I’ve seen a couple of them making fun of some photo contest of yours. What’s that all about?

Alpay: Well, I am a founding member of what’s called the Spanish Village Foundation. It’s a local nonprofit, whose sole mission is to “recognize, celebrate and promote the positive aspects of San Clemente.” That’s all it is, it’s a feel-good organization. Now, to generalize a bit, San Clemente is a city that’s divided into two. You’ve got Talega, and then the rest of San Clemente. Talega’s the newest development in San Clemente, it’s got a different feel, a different vibe. And so there’s a sort of us-versus-them mentality, and the effort along with the other founders who are – I live in Talega, and the other founders are outside of Talega – we’re trying to strengthen the bonds of San Clemente together.

Photo provided by San Clemente Historical Society

And one of the first programs we launched was the “Proclamation of Distinction,” which is an award program in eight different categories, we give out eight different awards, in each category, once per year. And so we recognize, generally people who have worked for the betterment of the community. It doesn’t matter what their political background is, it doesn’t matter what their political philosophy is, as long as they’re working with the altruistic goal of improving their community, then we want to recognize them for that.

We intentionally seek out those who are not in the spotlight as a way to say thank you and recognize them for their efforts. There are other things we’re doing in the Spanish Village Foundation, like we’re trying to restore weather vanes that the town’s founder Ole Hanson included in his “Spanish Colonial Revival” architecture, which was dormant in San Clemente and now the city is trying to restore through the use of architectural overlay districts. People have forgotten these old weather vanes he had custom-made for all the buildings, and what we want to do is restore those throughout the town, put all these landmarks through ALL of San Clemente, and show that we’re all one community together, regardless of background, we’re all the same, we’re all proud to be members of this great city.

OJ: So, that’s all THAT is. It sounds like a fine project. If these characters want to make fun of that, well, to hell with them.

So what made you decide to run for School Board?

Alpay: I ran for City Council two years ago in San Clemente, and my intention was to run again. My passion and interests are in San Clemente local politics. I had my operation, my plans in place to run for Council again, but people kept strongly encouraging me to consider School Board. School Board wasn’t originally at the top of my list because my children were too young for the School District, but with my daughter Autumn entering school this year it became a higher priority, so I started paying attention to it, and people encouraged me to go to the Board meetings.

So I went to one. This was in February I believe. And Mike Winsten was sitting there and comparing CUSD to LA Unified, and how LA was a great role model for us, how CUSD should look to LA and copy their best practices. Well, we’re in Orange County – San Clemente is in the deep south of Orange County. We’re not Los Angeles. We do things our own way. We don’t emulate Los Angeles. If anything they should be copying us; I just think we’re smarter than that.

And for a CUSD trustee to be sitting there on the dais, and openly advocate that we should be looking to LA Unified as a model, to me is an unmitigated disgrace. Unacceptable. And I think it’s a reflection on how the school district here has declined, and frankly gives me grave concern for the education of my children. My children come first, and so I set aside my efforts to win a seat on the San Clemente City Council.

OJ: Isn’t LA Unified, like, a really low-performing district?

Alpay: LA Unified?! Well, it’s certainly not the best.

OJ: And you guys, in spite of the Board you have now, are one of the better ones, aren’t you?

Alpay: Well, it’s come down a bit. It was a great school district, now it’s just “good.”

Mike Winsten’s philosophy, and his struggle against integration.

OJ: So, talk a little about the trustee you’re running to replace, the famous Mike Winsten.

Alpay: Well, I don’t know much about him personally, so maybe I’m not the best person to ask. But I do know he and I are similar in one key respect – we’re both well educated individuals. We both went to good undergraduate schools, we both got law degrees, and we both earned MBA’s, so we both went to business school. But you’ve got to fundamentally look at how we utilize our education – how it impacts our outlook and how we operate.

Winsten’s very proud of his twenty-four years of experience as a trial attorney. To me that explains his mentality of conflict, that’s so much ingrained in him, because he’s a trial attorney. So his philosophy during conflicts is one of a “zero-sum game.” “For me to win, you have to lose.” So he uses primarily his law degree and thinks like a lawyer, and operates on that philosophy of a “zero-sum game.” It’s classic Gordon Gekko: I win and you lose.

On the other hand, I come from more of a business background, and my education and training are used in a different aspect. I work in the corporate environment, where you’d say, “Let’s try to work toward a mutually beneficial solution, a ‘pareto-optimal outcome’ if you will , try to find something that will resolve the situation.” There are times and situations where you must fight and one side will or must lose, but it is rarely acceptable for that to be your first instinct. Very little is accomplished with that kind of mentality.

At the end of the day, regardless of the outcome of this election, Area 3 will be represented by someone with a legal background. So the fundamental question voters will need to ask themselves: Do you want a lawyer on the Board who has a business degree, or do you want a businessman on the Board who has a law degree?

Alpay: That litigation related to San Juan Hills High School. Now, I wasn’t a part of that, I wasn’t involved in that. That matter involved the use of race in deciding high school boundaries, especially given the large Hispanic population in the area. My first dealing with Winsten was after that when the issue was over the attendance boundaries for Vista del Mar (VDM) which is the elementary and middle school for the Talega community. And he was doing a lot of work formulating a number of arguments to keep all of Talega within VDM’s boundaries. The proposal from the District was to send kids from a portion of Talega to another school a few miles down the road. Since Winsten was formulating arguments against dividing Talega, I exchanged a number of e-mails with him.

His argument was that since Talega residents paid the “Mello Roos” tax, they should be entitled to use the new facilities. I agreed with his argument, but I also suggested another argument where the portion of Talega to be assigned to the other school included the low income Title 9 housing, which so happens to be mostly Hispanic. School policy requires the Board to consider socioeconomic factors to keep a school from becoming a high wealth or poor kid school exclusively and from my perspective, the new proposed boundaries would violate their own rules. To be clear, there was no use of race in determining school boundaries at this time and that was most certainly not my argument. When I pointed this socioeconomic policy out to Winsten, he pretty much blew me off. I didn’t think too much of it at the time because I thought he saw me as some Johnny-come-lately and he clearly had been involved in the matter for quite some time.

OJ: So, let me get this straight: First Winsten successfully sued to keep his kids out of a high school which happened to be majority Hispanic. And then he unsuccessfully argued that the lower-income kids in his own neighborhood, who also happen to be majority Hispanic, should not be allowed to attend his kids’ elementary and middle schools.

Alpay: Yeah, that’s about right.

A certain young Hispanic Alpay.

OJ: Sounds like maybe a pattern Do you get the impression he was trying to keep his kids from having to go to school with Hispanic kids?

Alpay: Well… I was explaining to a friend of mine how Winsten blew off my argument about the Title 9 housing as it related to the VDM boundaries and I was told that Winsten said to the Board that he did not believe that the residents in Title 9 housing in Talega were entitled to go to VDM. His theory was that because they did not pay Mello Roos, because they were renters, they were not entitled to the same rights as people who owned a house in Talega. I don’t agree with Winsten’s theory because even though they are renters, they still live in an area subject to Mello Roos. And if you consider the location of the housing, it would be impractical to assign that housing area to a different school because they would need to drive past other developments in Talega just to get out of the area to head to the other proposed school. And on top of that, if you follow the same line of thought, if somebody rents a house in Talega, then they too would be ineligible to attend VDM as well.

I don’t know if Winsten has an issue with his kids going to a school with Hispanics, especially considering at least one of his kids is at San Clemente High School now, which does have some Hispanic students. However, given his involvement in the San Juan Hills High School litigation and his position regarding the Title 9 housing, it certainly made me stop and question his motives. Only Winsten knows the true answer to that question.

OJ: I don’t imagine you have any problem with Hispanics?

Alpay: Well, I’d better not! My wife and kids are Hispanic. That would certainly make for an interesting domestic environment if I had that kind of problem!

Harassment and Intimidation by the Beall/Board Crowd

(the Bealls & Winsten celebrate a victory)

Alpay: In connection with the lawsuit against me over my ballot statement, Jennifer Beall came to my place of work, to formally serve me with the complaint. And I was not in the office so she could not effect service. My office told her that I was away on business…

OJ: Jennifer Beall herself, Lady Macbeth? They don’t have little gophers to do these things for them? [non-Capo readers: Tony and Jennifer Beall are the insider masterminds behind the current “reform” Board, and Jennifer is particularly active and outspoken.]

Alpay: Apparently not.

OJ: Maybe they’re that small and isolated of a group at this point.

Alpay: Maybe this is a reflection of how “strong” they are. So later that night a woman my wife politely described as a rotund blond lady tried to serve me at home, and my wife told her I wasn’t there, again saying that I was away on business. And the woman left and then five minutes later came back again, and in the process attempted to gain entry into the house and in the process assaulted my wife…

OJ: Assault? How do you mean?

Alpay: Maybe it’s best not to go into too many details right now. I’ve talked with my attorney about the issue and communicated our concern with the manner in which this individual conducted herself. We’re considering filing a civil suit once the election is over. There is something wrong with an individual who tries to serve legal papers on the defendant’s wife when she is home alone with three crying children late at night. It tells you how bad the situation was that my wife had to call 911. [The report number is 10-154332.] The Sheriff’s Department sent a deputy and even the duty sergeant was on scene at one point. One of my neighbors saw this woman attempt to break into my wife’s minivan before she went to the door. I can only guess as to her motives. My wife later saw a picture of Jennifer Beall in the Register and identified her as the woman who attacked her.

OJ: Jennifer’s denying it?

Alpay: So I hear. But what makes matters worse is that I come home the day after and there in front of my house I see MIKE WINSTEN.He’s in his car, trying to look into my wife’s mini-van, and driving around in front of my house, then he pulls over and sits in front of my house. Why is he stalking my family? Why the fascination with the mini-van? It makes no sense to me. It was him in his black BMW, with his New York Jets license plate frame – he’s a big Jets fan – California license plate 4JPC641.

OJ: Wow. These people are creepy.

Alpay: So, it’s kind of sad… they…

OJ: You think he was trying to find something out, or trying to intimidate you?

Alpay: Nothing more than a poor attempt at intimidation.

OJ: Are they picking on you specifically, maybe because you’re a fellow Republican, or are they bugging all five of the Children First candidates?

Alpay: As far as I understand they’re only focusing on me, I don’t understand why. But you know, I’m not going to be intimidated. My neighbors saw him, I’m not the only one. They were later asking me “Why is Mike Winsten in our neighborhood?” At first we all thought that we had a pedophile in our neighborhood.

OJ: [after long, hearty laughter] Okay, yeah, I can see that.

Alpay: Mike Winsten is subject to recall, he’s not actually a candidate. The issue is, should he be recalled or not, yes or no? Whether I’m running in the election to elect a replacement in the event he is recalled is not really material. Because if they want to attack me, that’s fine, but it doesn’t address the fundamental issue: Should Winsten be recalled or not? Attacking or intimidating me gains him nothing. I mean, it makes no sense, it’s illogical, but I perceive it as nothing more than an attempt at intimidation.

All that being said, there is one thing I want to be clear about. People can say what they want about me, they can attack me, they can ridicule me, they can criticize me and say what they please on the blogs. I put myself out there when I started running for office so I am a fair target. People can even exercise their God given rights as Americans to file frivolous litigation against me. There is nothing I can do to stop that. But when Winsten and his ilk take affirmative actions to go after my family, I take strong exception to that. It is all the more galling when Winsten says “Gee, I hope my family’s left out of this.” It is almost as if he says, my family is off limits, but Alpay’s wife and kids, including his five month old son are fair game. That is not acceptable.

About Vern Nelson

Greatest pianist in Orange County, and official troubador of both Anaheim and Huntington Beach (the two ends of the Santa Ana Aquifer.) Performs regularly both solo, and with his savage-jazz quintet The Vern Nelson Problem. Reach at vernpnelson@gmail.com, or 714-235-VERN.

96 Comments

Mr. Alpay’s ‘declined the opportunity to seek the union endorsement’ is a tad bit different than his ballot statement of “No one can accuse me of accepting support from the unions”

So, you still want to take that side bet?

I will bet you lunch ANYWHERE in the big OC that Mr. Alpay will accept support from the unions. Support equals the same thing that support means when the sheriff gives it to their supervisor candidates: Money, IE’s and walking Alpay’s materials = support. Also, the teachers are already starting to send emails out.

He IS the union candidate, this is a Union driven recall and it is as obvious as KNOWING that a cow with horns can only be defined as a boy cow. (or a bull in some parlance)

Further, your pedophile comments are utterly (which is NOT a boy cow) uncalled for and honestly it causes me to lose respect for you.

I am starting to figure out why you care so much about this race and I bet it is the Korpi connection and another agenda.

I can’t wait for you folks to bring in the conservative agenda. Open that door and see what happens next.

I’m still on for the side bet, that Alpay keeps his distance from the union, and continues to eschew their support. Still haven’t heard from you, so I’m guessing you’re not as sure as you sound in your comments. chezvern@aol.com

Care to elaborate on this “conservative” agenda? The folks you’re defending are all conservative talk, not walk, all conservative bite, not bark. There’s nothing conservative about the insane unending waste of taxpayer money that should be going into the kids’ schools. If by “conservative” you mean demonizing teachers and attempting to destroy their standard of living, then sure they’ve made attempts at that, but I don’t think any good conservatives would accept that as a definition.

I know John Alpay and I am also very familiar with the Children First candidates and the campaign. There is NO WAY that John Alpay is going to be accepting any union support. CUEA isn’t endorsing him and they aren’t going to spend any money in IE for him ( or Martha McNicholas either). That is a flat-out fact. Nothing will be done by any union on behalf of either of them.

The Teamsters will work for Maddox and Winsten though…remember these guys? These are the guys that: voted to waste millions in unnecessary consultants and attorneys, approved $655,000 in out of court settlements to pay off their campaign donors (Bealls, Russells, Reardons, etc ), wasted over $2M on attorneys who were their friends, whose actions hurt my property values, and who couldn’t keep a single promise they made when they ran for office. These guys are scum!

I encourage everyone to take Crock’s bet and bankrupt the fool over this conspiracy of union support. That notion is a crock.

Vern, I think the pedophile comment is very appropriate. Winsten is anti-kid, and his and his buddys’ agenda hurts kids. Their actions are abusive to kids, parents and voters. By extrapolation he and his actions abuse kids. Kind of fits the definition.

Yes, the fool that I am knows though that Mr. Alpay will be the SOLE beneficiary of the CUEA spending on the Yes on Recall for his trustee area.

Mr. Alpay IS the union candidate regardless of how violently he (and you) protest.

I keep hearing you guys claim that the teamsters are going against the CUEA and supporting Winsten and Lopez-Maddox and I keep asking for a shred of proof.

And each time I get called a ‘fool’, ‘stupid’, blah blah blah, but oddly enough, there is never any proof.

It is too bad that none of the attempts to paint the unions going after each other here is true in any sense of the word and aside from the fact that it highly illogical, the union leadership would be utterly foolish as they don’t have a friend in the sitting Trustees (unlike Mr, Alpay – in his own words)

For you, this was a well written story (considering your disdain for us crazy conservatives). Only a smattering of unverified hearsay. I’ll commend Alpay for resisting most of your attempts to bait him on Winsten. But I agree with “crock” that the pedophile comment was way out of line, particularly with the lawsuit the Juice is currently facing with links to a questionable website along those lines.

I don’t see much substance here, Vern, though you did a good job of spinning what little that Mr. Alpay has to offer. You worked in the cool references to historic San Clemente. The inferences of scandal and the “stalking”. Well, that’s just too much. Nice smear.

Mr. Alpay’s recollection of the 2005 disputes concerning SJHHS are simply wrong. In all likelihood, he had no actual interest in that matter and your attempt to spin it into a race issue are simply desperate. Even your idea that SJHHS is, today, a “majority Hispanic” school would come as a surprise to parents in Ladera Ranch, from which much of the enrollment is drawn. The truth is available on the CUSD website. SJHHS is 34% Hispanic and 55% White. By comparison, San Clemente HS is 19% Hispanic. The difference is negligible. But if have ever taken the drive from Talega to SJHHS, a route that takes you past San Clemente HS, on to the 5 Freeway, off at Ortega and east for miles… you would understand why a Telega resident might resent the idea that CUSD used their kids to justify the construction of a high school at the dump.

The Mello-Roos argument is interesting, we agree. If you pay for it, shouldn’t you be allowed to use it?.

On the whole, you obvious attempt to elect John Aplay and demonize the Bealls won’t work. Alpay is an empty bag and the Beall do not control the OC GOP Central Committee any more than they control CUSD.

Bottom line: If somebody broke the law on Alpay’s porch, then the Sheriff would referred the matter to the DA and an arrest would occur. An allegation of assault is itself a crime if it is a false allegation. So is filing a false police report. Have you actually read the police report?

Nobody greets a legally served summons with happiness. But generally, people who overreact to a knock on the door and dial 911 have something to hide.

And I wonder if those figures were any different in 2005 than they are now. I don’t know. That first issue would seem more innocent anyway if it weren’t for the second one added to it. What is this nonsense that renters don’t pay “Mello-Roos” taxes and so aren’t eligible for the schools those taxes pay for? Even JR agrees on that. It’s nonsense when people say renters don’t pay taxes – it’s included in their rent! If that bogus argument of Winsten’s isn’t driven by anti-hispanic animus, it’s at the very least anti-working class.

Mr. Alpay no reason to be confused- someone posted your endorsements on Beyond the Blackboard and it is plain as day…they are scared…very scared you can win. I also see now why they do not want Measure H to pass…it appears the entire town (politically) is behind you. Granted this is only a partial list from your website http://www.johnalpay.com/endorsements.html :
•Jim Dahl; Mayor, City of San Clemente

•Lori Donchak; Councilman and Former Mayor, City of San Clemente

•Susan Ritschel; Former Mayor, City of San Clemente

•Candy Haggard; Former Mayor, City of San Clemente

•Scott Diehl; Former Mayor, City of San Clemente

•Alan Korsen; Former Councilman, City of San Clemente

•Tom Hribar; Councilman, City of San Juan Capistrano

•Mario Rodriguez; Former Vice Chairman, California Republican Party

•Pall Gudgeirsson; City Treasurer, City of San Clemente

•Nesa O. Anderson; Vice Chair and Planning Commissioner, City of San Clemente

•Lew Avera; Planning Chair Pro Tem and Commissioner, City of San Clemente

•Dan Bane; Planning Commissioner, City of San Clemente

•John Tengdin; Former Planning Commissioner, City of San Clemente

•Steven Streiger; Parks & Recreation Vice Chairman and Commissioner, City of San Clemente

•Chris McCormack; Parks & Recreation Commissioner, City of San Clemente

•Bill Osier; Parks & Recreation Commissioner, City of San Clemente

•Eric Swartz; Parks & Recreation Commissioner, City of San Clemente

•Bob Maltinsky; Former Parks & Recreation Commissioner, City of San Clemente

•Bill Hart; Coastal Advisory Committee Chairman and Member, City of San Clemente

•Ken Neilson; Coastal Advisory Committee Member, City of San Clemente

•Eric Swartz; Coastal Advisory Committee Member, City of San Clemente

•Lew Avera; General Plan Advisory Committee Member, City of San Clemente

•Dan Bane; General Plan Advisory Committee Member, City of San Clemente

•Marvin Dennis; General Plan Advisory Committee Member, City of San Clemente

•John Dorey; General Plan Advisory Committee Member, City of San Clemente
•Bill Hart; General Plan Advisory Committee Member, City of San Clemente

•Gary Headrick; General Plan Advisory Committee Member, City of San Clemente
•Alan Korsen; General Plan Advisory Committee Member, City of San Clemente

HA! Guess what. These guys are threatening to sue us now, for this story. Beall and Winsten. Maybe they can waste some more school district money and retain Phil Greer to bring down this blog for reporting what a candidate tells us. They say they’re going to meet with an attorney regarding this at noon tomorrow, and they darkly warn us through a mutual friend, “the Juice would not be immune from backlash if we do not pull the story down.” LOL.

First & most easily: They’ve been running around all day on their silly blogs and elsewhere saying “The Orange Juice called Mike Winsten a pedophile! The Unions called Mike Winsten a pedophile! John Alpay called Mike Winsten a pedophile!” THESE morons are involved in education, who can’t even parse a simple sentence? Not even worth a response, anyone can look above and see what was written.

The rest of what they object to is about Jennifer Beall’s rough behavior toward Mrs. Alpay. That is us reporting what Mr. Alpay told us. We’re firmly within our rights to report what a political candidate tells us. And he stands by what he told us too, which is also what he and his wife told the cops.

You know who’s got a problem here is Jennifer Beall. She’s been telling different stories to different people all day long. Ah, what a tangled web she weaves. I’ve got an e-mail here from John with like ten different contradictions in her stories; I’m not inclined to bore our readers with that at this point.

Sit down and get your story straight? That ship has sailed. 🙁

These clowns just love to sue at the drop of a hat – as we’ve seen throughout their tenure at CUSD. And we’re not inclined to feel intimidated by them. It is rewarding to know that our story disturbs them so much. Oh, they’re going to just love the next one!

Eh, didn’t mean to sound like I’m blaming anything on anyone, I’m very proud of this story.

1. Obviously nobody called Mike a pedophile. But he’s been complaining to a mutual friend that we did, and I hear it was also all over their – what – their deceptively named “Capo kids First” Facebook page (which they so named to try to fool people into thinking they were us – funny)

2. All the Jennifer Beall stuff is from what John tells us, and I believe him. That’s pretty far from blaming him for anything.

Thanks for going to that site for us, Crock, I don’t have the stomach for it. You can be our eyes and ears over there. I heard they were saying that in various places, and they did write it to our colleague Larry (whom I was trying to keep out of it.) It’s still a ridiculous exaggeration to claim we were “implying he could be one.” When the only statement (which was humorous) was that from a distance, without anyone knowing it was Winsten, that’s how his behavior and demeanor appeared to people.

Where do they get this “Union” nonsense anyway? that’s supposed to be factual?

What a crock

Posted September 14, 2010 at 11:27 AM

Vern,

I just saw a post over there that the unions have endorsed the entire program.

Art. That is NOT what I was told. They did not state that Vern called Winsten a pedophile. However, the post gives the impression that by mentioning Winsten in the same paragraph someone might jump to that conclussion.
Let me quote from the post. “My neighbors saw him, I’m not the only one. They were later asking me “Why in Mike Winsten in our neighborhod?” At first we all thought we had a pedophile in our neighborhood.”

When a summons is served, the processor server has to sign documents and identify themselves. As an attorney Mr. Alpay is certainly aware of this. There should be no mystery about who this person was.

If Mrs. Alpay was assaulted, I hope she will press charges. If she doesn’t press charges, I doubt her story.

This whole story reminds me of Fleming – remember the tale about the hacked computer system? A “crime” was supposedly committed but no charges were sought. Just smear those with whom you disagree. Truly “old school” board.
And Erin Kutnick keeps turning up like the bad penny she is.

There is no “union side” and when Crock insinuates this all credibility is lost. There is a parent and community side and there is an outside interest side with unions supporting existing trustees.

These trustees wasted millions hiring their attorney and consultant friends.

These trustees voted to approve out of court settlements totaling over $655,000 which were paid directly to individuals that financed and managed their campaigns. Beall = Bell = corruption.

These trustees spent over $2M in attorney fees when they could have kept their promise and hired an in-house counsel or used the free services provided by the OCDE

Due to the instability and dysfunction of these incompetent trustees our home values are suffering. Our communities are suffering.

These trustees kept NONE of the promises they made to ME when I voted for THEM. Class sizes are much higher, facilities are in worse shape, there has been no healing in the district, they flip flopped on the by-trustee voting method promise and the list goes on and on.

What they did do is make their patron Tony Beall richer and make their outside interest financial backers very happy. Throw these bums out.

Since our friend here has mentioned the ‘other’ site. They are posting that the unions have endorsed and are supporting the Yes on Recall, Yes on H and the candidates. SHOCK OF SHOCKS! OMG!

You poor union folks are trying so hard to spin a yarn about how the trustees are so evil and ‘tyrants’ and as Vern so blamed Alpay about that there was concern that Winsten could be a pedophile. Come on.

Do you even know how much the board spent on attorney fees before these conservative trustees were seated? Do you have any idea? Of course you don’t.

And, of course you don’t have a clue as to what you are talking about with inside counsel.

Ask your patron, Mr. Alpay, how he does HIS in-house counsel job work. In-house counsel typically is responsible for HIRING OUTSIDE attorneys to do the work and managing them. It is a MANAGEMENT position in most instances and NOT a replacement for the outside firms. There honestly isn’t enough legal work in Capo to justify an in-house counsel.

Also, do you really think that the County of Orange Education Department can replace the legal work done at the district level for free? REALLY?

Do you even know how much the board spent on attorney fees before these conservative trustees were seated? Do you have any idea?

For about the ninth time, nobody is sticking up for Fleming and his puppets. NOBODY wants to go back to those bad old days. You create a false choice between two evils. Do I need to re-post that whole Shah/Ayatollahs/Green Revolution thing? That was my point there, doesn’t seem like you grasped it.

You are not grasping that the existing trustees have been night and day compared to the previous union backed trustees.

You are spending so much energy saying that these trustees are bad, yet they are so much better than the old guard and the union backed Measure H was INITIATED by ERIN KUTNICK and DUANE STIFF. (THE OLD GUARD).

This isn’t really that complicated nor does it take a six degrees of separation type of analysis to get from A to Z here.

Can the sitting trustees be better, of course (and of course I can be a better husband and father too). But, in the union’s eyes, the trustees are pure evil and can do NO right and have NEVER done anything right and that just doesn’t hold any water.

Your friends actually are believing this stuff and it is really unhealthy because it is just not true and they are going to blame everyone but themselves when the results don’t happen that they want in November.

This is why your arguments are empty. I was there when the Measure H initiative started. Stiff had nothing to do with it EVER. Your assumption is incorrect as is your paranoia and conspiracies about who or what is behind the community’s anger against this board.

There are no union people or influences in Children First or the Recall or Measure H. I am there for every meeting and there is ZERO truth in your assertion. How can I believe anything you post when your base assumptions are so wrong.

Those out of court settlements proved these trustees were stupid. no matter how an attorney want to justify these, three of the trustees had the sense to abstain. These are guys are NOT better than the old trustees. I voted for your recall and I voted for many of these trustees. This was before we found out that they had created a propaganda movie. This was before we learned that they were taking money from The Education Alliance. This was before they revealed their true agendas including: Winsten telling his friends in Talega and at VDM that he wanted to turn the school into a charter and Jennifer and Winsten saying that everything should be outsourced and teachers should be on a year to year contract.

We went from very bad to much, much worse. I don’t want seven right wing nuts running a school board. I don’t mind “conservative” but not wackos. I don’t want people on a PUBLIC SCHOOL BOARD with kids in private school or no kids in any school. I don’t want people on a school board that are career politicians or heavily affiliated with one political party or another. This is what YOU brought us. You and your friends brought us a mini-Bell with payoffs/payouts to their friends. That money could have been used in the classroom. They didn’t need to hire Kinsler or Greer…..Greer!! The attorney for Bryson’s disgraced boss!! Come on?@?$$@#?$ These guys are way worse then we had. I don’t want the Fleming bunch and I certainly don’t want this bunch. Are you possibly arguing that we should keep these people because in your opinion they are better than what we had? that we can’t do better? everyone wants a new board….the parents, the teachers, their association, anyone with a home that cares about their home values, Republicans and Democrats and Decline to State. This isn’t about unions vs “conservative” trustees or Fleming vs “reform” fools. This is about a new board, a new era and an end to the fighting and special interests. If Tony Beall and friends would just SHUT UP AND GO AWAY these trustees might actually have kept their jobs but bullies can’t be silent.

Duane Stiff was one of the three original initiators along with Kunick and the lady who sued (and lost),Trudy Podobas.

The union side submitted the letters back and forth between them and the County in 2009 to try and figure out how to make this scheme work. Erin even submitted these in their package to the Courts. And guess what, the ONLY three names are what I’ve noted above.

I am looking right at the letter dated June 2, 2009 in ERIN’S Declaration packet for the lawsuit they lost which is written to:

Duane Stiff
Trudy Podobas
Erin Kutnick

It is YOUR exhibit B.
It is YOUR OWN RECORDS!

Further, there is another Orange County Board of Education Letter on May 20th to the same three.

Further, there is ANOTHER OCBE letter under your exhibit C that is dated June 8, 2009 to the same three.

FURTHER, there is yet another OCBE letter that is under a separate cover that says that ‘in the meeting with Duane Stiff’. (which was NOT in that packet but elsewhere – just in case someone wants to imply that I am a story teller!)

I love the informality of the letters too: “Dear Duane, Trudy and Erin,”

Seriously, If you are going to fabricate the facts, you honestly have to do a better job of it!

You are either misinformed or a liar yourself. Stiff was the person who started the whole Measure H process starting in March of 2009 (Remember, the current board was not sworn in until December of 2008). Unless you’ve personally reviewed the records of the OCDE on the matter you don’t know what you’re talking about.

CUEA, Children First and Parents for Local Control are tied at the hip. They list each other sites, they coordinated recall rallies and getting recall petitions signed. Hell, the teachers strike was simply a ploy to allow teachers to get recall petitions signed while on strike (don’t believe me, read the strike instructions teachers were given) and to create negative PR for the current board in order to enhance the CUSD unions efforts to takeover CUSD. A CTA rep even admitted this to parents.

After reading and re-reading Crock’s posts I am disturbed by the constant return to the same theme. According to this person, if a person is a board opponent that have to be a union member or sympathizer. Worse, they have to be a Kutnick lover or a Fleming supporter. There is no middle ground with this person. Within this “beautiful mind” the only way a person can be against the board and in disagreement with Crock is if they are part of the “union conspiracy” that exists mostly in this person’s head.

I have seen these types of posts before. There are a handful of people that sued CUSD over the enemies list, who donated money and supported these trustees, and got paid huge amounts of money in those out of court settlements. The primary beneficiaries of these settlements were Tony and Jennifer Beall, Tom Russell and Jim Reardon. The Beall’s you know and we all wish would move away. Tom Russell did take the money and run. He moved to Idaho. Reardon is still here with us and is running for SJC City Council. He and his family got one of the largest chunks of money in those settlements. He is as right wing and conspriatorial a person as exists. If you want to do an interesting article on someone you might want to investigate this guy. Loathed and pitied in SJC and outside of that city this is one very interesting case study in paranoia and conspiracy. Even money crock is one of the recipients of those settlements but which one? The first two guesses don’t count.

You are either an idoit or a liar, probably both. The information about the settlement is now public knowledge and record because the current board agreed to waive the attorney client privilege so that the public could learn the truth, not the fable you and others continue to spin. Why don’t you ask Mr. Aply is he would have voted for the settlement when (1) the insuring agency that CUSD is a member of negotiated the settlement without any involvement or input from the CUSD board or any of its members [you ignore this fact]; (2) all the other defendants [Fleming and the gang] had already approved the settlement [You ignore that fact]; (2) the attorney who was retained by the insuring agency to represent CUSD recommended the CUSD board approve the settlement because the likely awards to be rendered if the case went to trial would be significantly, i.e. millions of dollars more than the settlement amount [you ignore this fact]; and the insuring agency pointedly told the CUSD board that if it did not approve the settlement it would withdraw coverage and the provision of a defense.

Of course, if the CUSD board had rejected the settlement, proceeded to trial and lost, facing millions of dollars of damages that would have to be paid out of the general fund, how would you and the rest of your allies reacted? Of course, you would have patted the board on the back and said job well done. NOT, you and your allies would have villifed the board for not following the recommendation of the attorney retained to represent CUSD and thus exposing CUSD to millions of dollars in damages.

You and your kind have been after the current CUSD board before they were even sworn in. I assume you were one of the people who were screaming recall at the December 2008 meeting when the board was sworn in. There is nothing the current Board could do to please you, and that’s clear from your various posts.

Please, there was no enemies list! It was all a fabrication. And there were supposedly hundreds of people on that list, why didn’t they get their money? Oh, they actually didn’t SUE their own school board.

And if it was such a slam dunk of a case, why hasn’t Fleming been convicted yet? Oh that’s right. He wasn’t. But the OC Register never actually reported on that part, there wasn’t enough evidence of an “enemies list”.

False and Misleading is the name of the game for the union. It is too bad that EVERY one of these websites have been squatted on by the Union.

False and Misleading (is what the Judge said the union and union candidates were) and it continues:

They did it during the negotiations before the strike,
They did it leading up to the strike vote
They did it during the strike

Then,

They did it when they said they were not involved in the Recall
They did it when they said they were not involved in Measure H
They did it when they put out the ballot statements (and got a stern talking to by the judge in court)
They did it when they sued the existing trustees for their statements (and were soundly beat and told that they had no merit)

And now, they are doing it again.

Gee, don’t you realize that you are doing nothing but hurting your own credibility?

Actually you are full of crap. it took six months for the Board to figure out a way to use district personel in a lame attempt to try to defend those settlements. The criminal cases those civil suits were based on were thrown out. Therefore the settlement wasn’t needed. There were lots of people on that “enemies list” including members of Children First. No one was harmed by being on that list and the courts agreed with that assessment. Even three of the current trustees abstained from the vote because it smelled like cat sick.

Interesting to nofe:

1) Winsten and Beall forced a special election in June of 2008 scheduled just two weeks after the June primary. Because of this timing $800,000 was siphoned out of the classroom for this election.

2) Elected in this special recall election were Maddox and Palazzo. The candidates they were running against had said they weren’t running for re-election in November but something must have been really important for Beall and Winsten to force this election anyway and waste $800,000 in the process.

3) Maddox then insists on getting sworn in on July 1st weeks before the regularly scheduled Board meeting where he would have normally been sworn in. Why?

4) On July 2nd, Beall, Russell, Reardon and friends re-file their law suit! The reasons are now clear!! Now that they have purchased themselves five trustees they now have the majority needed to push their lawsuits to a settlement.

5) In November Winsten joins Brick on the board and now there are seven out of seven Beall puppets nicely set up in preparation for the settlement votes to follow in August and September of 2009.

In Sept 2009 the settlemetns are announced. Three trustees abstain from some of these votes. The result is over $655,000 being paid to a list that is 100% the same as a list of campaign donors and supporters. The Bealls and friends had promised to pay CUSD the “net proceeds” of any monies received from their lawsuits but have now conveniently forgotten this pledge. Promises and the truth don’t matter to the Bells…I mean the Bealls and their fellow puppet masters. This is all about money. Taking money from CUSD and sending it to their attorney friends, their consultant friends and their campaign supporters. The kids suffer, the classrooms suffer and our communities suffer.

Don’t even suggest that there is any way to defend those settlements. You couldn’t even convince all your puppets to vote for them. You thought you would get away with it and you won’t. That was the nail in the coffin of corruption rampant in CUSD. By taking that money and failing to pay it back as promised YOU doomed your hand picked pupeets to defeat on Nov 2nd. Deal with it!

I don’t know many of the details but the game falls apart when you try and tie Maddox’s swearing in to the lawsuit and a settlement over a year later. (was Maddox going on vacation during the time of the normal swearing in and that is why they advanced it?) Do you even know?

I had heard that there was a change of attorney for the lawsuit and that was why it was refiled, but again, I don’t really know the details.

Can you please tell me which of the three trustees abstained from the vote?

And, since you are so good at throwing stones and attempting to use the 2+2 logic, would you have gone against the insurance company recommendation to settle and taken the risk of a jury trial with an enemies list and a fairly sympathetic plaintiff in Mr. Reardon? Well, it is a fair question since you are criticizing the decision?

See, I am getting a tad bit tired of this ‘Monday Morning’ quarterbacking.

Here is what I pulled down from one of Pritchard’s (he is the union candidate for the Maddox seat) wife’s posts:

“The second settlement was approved on a 4-0 vote and resulted in $178,350 being paid to the Beall, Russell and Furniss families. Trustees Addonizio, Christiansen and Palazzo recused themselves from this vote. Maddox stated that those three trustees abstained because the families receiving the settlements had lent money to the political action committee that had elected the three to office.”

I’ve been hearing about $650K in settlements to “the Bealls”. I swore that is what I’ve been reading? About the pools and the Mercedes and the blah, blah, blah

Further, the total of ALL settlements were $650K but the vast majority went to the Reardon child (you know, the special ed child noted below – which *I* didn’t know until right now)

And, to add insult to injury, who woulda thunk that two of the three candidates that the union is going after RECUSED themselves from approving it because they had received support.

Oh man. Strike me down with Lightning!

What the hell is going on?

Vern, regardless of what side of the issue you are on, how do YOU reconcile this one?

I’m just glancing over at my laptop in between phone-banking for a candidate… but I see this

who woulda thunk that two of the three candidates that the union is going after RECUSED themselves from approving it because they had received support.

Well… I hope nobody said that voting in favor of these awards was the ONLY reason these five are getting recalled/replaced. I can’t answer for everything my side says here, just like you’re not responsible for everything your side says. There is a list of grievances that includes those awards. You can find those.

What a crock

Posted September 14, 2010 at 11:24 PM

Hey Vern,

There really isn’t anything else that they have been throwing out except that the board paid off its buddies. (yet, when I show that it isn’t true, you say it isn’t relevant)

And that the legal fees are too high in the district (but when I stated that they are less than before the current trustees, you say it is not relevant)

And that the board unilaterally took a 10% pay cut (and I show that the board took less than the fact finder recommended, you say it is not relevant)

Are you starting to see a pattern?

Every time I show that the arguments are no good, you and your cohorts say that the facts are not relevant.

The union is just pissed that they lost the last elections and they do not control the board.

Seven families who said they were harassed and intimidated after their names appeared on two Capistrano Unified “enemies lists” will be awarded $653,350 in lawsuit settlements reached with the district.

In exchange, Capistrano Unified will admit to no wrongdoing, and the families will take no further legal action against the district. The deals were approved Sept. 15 by the school board, but settlement documents and amounts weren’t released until Friday and today because the legal language was being finalized.

…

The settlement agreements were authorized by Capistrano’s “reform”-minded school board, the same group many of the families in the lawsuits helped elect. Indeed, the leaders of the politically popular “reform” movement – including Beall and Tom Russell – will receive some of the $653,350 settlement money.

What a crock

Posted September 14, 2010 at 10:34 PM

So, you are confirming exactly what I wrote above that for the Beall settlement: Addonizio and Christiansen recused themselves, so how can you fairly lump them into the Beall settlements?

Further, are you really going to go after a settlement with a special needs child?

May I suggest that instead of just reading the reporters information or listening to just your union, that you become actually educated before you start casting stones.

I’ve tried really hard to have support for each of my claims and have been willing to provide the path to the conclusions.

The union side keeps claims the settlements were for the enemies list. Read the complaints that were filed. The claims against Fleming, CUSD, etc. went far beyond the enemies list. The exposure in the cases was substantial. That’s why Fleming and the other defendants (except for CUSD) couldn’t sign off on the settlement fast enough. What the attorney for the insuring agency stated to CUSD was that the conduct of Fleming and the other individual defendants was so bad, i.e. intentional, that the insuring agency beleived it could move to have its coverage terminated on that basis if the settlement it negotiated was not approved by all defendants, including CUSD. Better yet, since CUSD waived the attorney client priviledge so the details of the claims and settlements could be conveyed to the public, why don’t you contact the attorney who represented CUSD and get the information from him first hand. Bottom line, ignorant people who have no desire to learn the truth say and do stupid things.

I am a lawsuit recipient.
I collected many signatures to recall the Fleming trustees in 2005. During this time frame, my disabled child was targeted by his school principal and others in CUSD. My name was put on a list and Erin Kutnick was contacting my neighbors to speak ill of me. As a result of this, my children were placed in private school, at significant expense. My children and I then sued the school district. My husband, Jim Reardon, is not a member of the recall committee, never collected a signature to recall anyone in the district. He never sued CUSD.

The “James Reardon” who settled with CUSD is my disabled son. Are you sure you want to go after him, Vern? Why don’t you come after me instead.

The proceeds I received from the lawsuit went to support a local school for autistic children who fall through the cracks in the public school system.

People were just speculating here on the identity of “What a Crock.” I’m not “coming after” any settlement recipients, although we do try to figure out the motivations of our opponents. Hats off for your donation.

and Jim Sr. did contribute money to Maddox and Maddox voted to approve those settlements. There were two votes. One was 7-0 and the other 4-0-3. Maddox, Winsten and Bryson voted YES both times. They took Beall, Russell and Reardon’s money and they voted to settle court cases that sent money back to the same people. That doesn’t pass the smell test for any reasonable person. This isnt’ about an autisitic child this is about out of court payments totalling over $655,000 paid to individuals that contributed to the campaigns of these trustees. No one can reasonably defend that.

OK, IF it is true that Maddox took money from Reardon Sr. AND voted for the settlement covering his son, I would agree that constitutes a conflict of interest.

But, the big picture is that in the four years that these trustees have been ‘in control’ the overall budget had exceeded $1.5 Billion dollars. and you want to throw them out over a $100,000 deductible?

Can you provide any proof that Mr. Reardon Sr. contributed to the Maddox 2008 election?

I cannot find any evidence of it.

And, the fact that 2/3 of the money went to the special needs child, and that the payout that included 2/3 of the remaining 1/3 NOT going to the bealls had two of the three candidates abstain is a huge fact in my mind.

Context is really important to the rest of us who are actually seeking facts to better form our opinion.

It is not just about the settlements. It’s about a whole bunch of issues, such as this board refusing to take training classes regarding their duties as Trustees. Refusing to engage the community, visit the schools, be involved, etc.

Oh, so the issue is that they didn’t take the same training that came from the association that the district just said no more to?

Like I have been saying, they cannot win. There is nothing they do right, everything is evil and they are tyrants in your eyes all because they didn’t cow-tow to the union.

It surely is no more complicated than that.

Nice try

Posted September 15, 2010 at 8:22 PM

Gee, how did I know that was going to come up. The training is still valuable regardless of the Association had bad management. Totally beside the point. More red herrings. You should open a fish shop.

Just read on the Capo Kids First site on Facebook that since the OC GOP just endorsed the ABC candidates and No on the Recall, that this is a battle between the Union vs. Republicans, Conservatives vs. Liberal.

When are you and your thick headed cohorts ever going to understand just how many Conservative, Republicans like myself are in favor of the Recall and voting out the current trustees? Oh, and guess what…I’m not a union lover either!

I have actually been a republican my whole adult life, which is about 30+ years, but I guess according to the Book of Crock since I don’t think exactly the way that you do on this issue, then I must be a liar about my political affiliation.

The whole union thing is so tired. It’s so stupid and so laughable now. You know you are so arrogant, and have nothing but time on your hands (as apparent by the amount of your posts), that it’s not even worth getting into an intelligent conversation with you because I don’t have the time to waste that you do.

$250 donated by Reardon Sr. to Maddox. Listed in the OC Register along with Beall’s and others donations. Reardon also participated and appeared in Winsten and Beall’s movie “Not as Good as you Think. The myth of the middle class school” which was a propaganda movie about privatizing public schools and showed CUSD in a very bad light. Reardon regularly is seen with Beall and friends at events where CUSD is moving in its right wing, off a cliff direction. He is part of this group no matter how much he denies it.

The lawsuit had nothing to do with autism or a special needs chils. Reardon and Beall’s lawsuits were about the “enemies list” which was later shown by the OC Courts to be without merit. It was those lawsuits, and nothing about special needs, that were settled and approved by this board. 7-0 for one set of suits and 4-0-3 for the other. All of them were for settling the enemies list suits. It stunk when they did it and three of the seven abstained because they also knew it was wrong. CUSD is as bad as Bell. These guys got caught with their hand in the cookie jar and now they will pay.

Crock, this isn’t “union vs ” anyone. This movement is parents and homeowners and Republicans and people in other parties. Yes the teachers care and they are involved but they are not leading this or controlling this. If you actually knew anything about the CUCF campaign you would know that there is a big separation between what the parents are doing and what others are doing.

“What a crock” is not Reardon. Get off of that. Go read Capo Kids First. Examine the punctuation style and content of the admin’s posts there. It’s that guy.

“The Most Annoying Man In The World”. You can’t go anywhere in the CUSD blogosphere without stepping in his mess. I am beginning to think that there are about 4 or 5 people that post 80% of all the posts on the CUSD blogs.

you are correct I think. This guy uses other people’s names to post under at The Blackboard and continues to print false information on that facebook page. I think there are only a dozen people at most helping these trustees get elected. They have checks though….and money taken from our classrooms to donate to their candidates too

Oh, man, I had no idea that I was posting on ‘The Blackboard’. Are my comments pithy, intelligent and oh so relevant there? Because they sure are here.

I also didn’t realize I was on the take.

You want to know more about me? Look up “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like”.

I most decidedly believe that you will feel better.

One thing though, how about focusing on the facts of what I’ve presented here vs whether I exist or not, or who I am.

Since you are claiming that I am the one who is putting out false information on the facebook page, have I reported any false information? I surely want to make sure that what I post is actual and factual.

See, these union folks cannot handle the facts being out there and they are seeking an enemy to attack instead of dealing with their issues. This is why they are trying to find out who I am, and that is exactly why I won’t spill the beans until after the election.

I actually have watched them go after everyone who supports the board in ugly and irresponsible ways. Including the Beall’s, Reardon’s, Craig Alexander, Greg Powers, Mark Bucher or any of the Red County guys who have commented against them. Let alone the irresponsible attacks against the five trustees, the people who sued Corbett, and a number of others. It is despicable.

Lastly, Vern, I promise you that I will come out from behind the mask after November 3rd and we can get lunch.

It must be him, if it is him, I like what he says as I’ve spent some time over at their page and read his stuff.

Or, is it someone pretending to be him, or someone who just wants to be him?

or me, or whomever I am. I am so confused. Am I real, do I exist or am I a figment of your imagination.

Or, is it ‘the man your man could smell like’

In all reality, who cares.

Vern, I make a PROMISE to you that I will introduce myself to you right after the election and we will get lunch. And regardless of who wins. I will buy. because I want to gloat. (and if my side looses, then I will give you permission to gloat too – but only a little bit!)

Yeah, Crock. You will be in need of consolation. I totally know that it takes some time to realize how wrong you’ve been, especially when you’ve been so outspoken. After a couple of drinks you’ll see how the new improved Board with Alpay, Pritchard, Alizhani, Hatton & McNichols might not really be so bad after all. Hey, maybe you could even afford to run yourself in ’12, once Measure H passes.

How long will it take your new board to give the unions what they want? Will your new board agree not to raise taxes or fees or not move for the issuance of new bonds during these dire financial times? Will your new board vote to get rid of less tenured teachers and increase class sizes so the teachers union can deliver to its senior memebers? How would your new board handle the $10 to $11 million dollar deficit CUSD is facing this year?

See, now where were you when I was soliciting questions for Alpay? Apart from the first one, those would have been much better questions than the “photo contest” and “campaign finance reform” that your allies came up with. I’ll forward your questions on to him, and the other four candidates as well. But could you be more specific about “giving the union what they want?” What is it exactly that you say they “want?”

What does that smart alec reply mean? Seriously, get over yourself. I didn’t ask what school your children go to, or their names, nor do I care and that isn’t any of my business.

I simply asked if you have children that attend CUSD schools, due to your interest level in this CUSD issue. Are you like certain people that have their noses so far into what is going on in our school district, yet have no children or relatives that even attend our schools? Or do you actually have a vested interest in our school board and district, because then I may have more understanding of your level of discontent.

I have children that attend CUSD schools. Wow, that was really hard to say. Uh oh, now I am really afraid that the Secret Union Police are going to come after me!

Trying to get straight story on recall, H, candidates, and SO disturbed by this discourse. Tone, assumptions, baiting and aspersions in article by “Vern” are gross and irresponsible. “Pedophile”, “rotund” and the like are beyond inappropriate in any forum. Shame on you. Looking further, I found that a simple phone conversation with staff at CUEA yields QUICKLY how they want me to vote… so I find Alpay’s comments on his site disingenuous. Clearly he is a union candidate, and all I know from painful experience as a parent is that the union strike permanently injured my students college experience. So I see ALPAY=UNION=HARM TO STUDENTS.

Questions of taste aside, it’s utterly retarded to call Alpay a “Union Candidate” just because this particular union prefers him to Mr. Winsten. Of course they would – Winsten’s gang has been trashing teachers and employees every which way they can. It would be WEIRD if the CUEA didn’t want to replace these guys.

That’s very far from him being a Union Candidate. Like he said, not accepting any Union money, he won’t be beholden to them, and will feel that much freer to vote against their wishes when he feels that’s in the interest of the district and the kids. Or, should I say, taxpayers, children and homeowners.

Here’s something to think about, for you folks who seem to not be able to go to sleep for fear that the Union is hiding underneath your beds: Two of the five Children First candidates – Republicans Alpay and McNicholas – have refused any union support in a desire to stay completely independent of that influence. (And who can blame Saam, Gary and Lynn from accepting help from anyone who offers it, when pre-Measure H campaigns can cost up to 200K?)

Given that my friends opted to not replace two of the old “reform” candidates, this means that – even if we manage to get all 5 Children First candidates in – there will still be a 4-3 majority on the Board that got no Union support. So it’s not gonna be Apocalypse Now for you Union haters.

Wow. Thanks for the thoughtful response. Now I see what kind of person hides here. I went searching Alpay’s site to learn what I could WITH NO PRE-EXISTING OPINION. I called the CUEA to ask sincere questions and got direct answers. You may not want to admit it, and you obviously want to work very hard to deflect it, but the union told me today that they want Alpay. Fine. Somehow his values seem to align with theirs more than others. Those are the facts I sought. That’s what I needed to know. And, yes, as a parent of three in the district, MY experience was that the decisions of the CUEA harmed my children who are college bound. I guess I was sincerely seeking opposing viewpoints and discussion to balance what I thought. Instead I see venom and bile and name-calling. And it’s still disturbing that you managed to print terms attacking personal appearance, “rotund”, and sexual perversion, “pedophile”, for a political foe. If my kids did that in any context, they would be in trouble. If I did that in my industry, I would be fired by my company for a breach of ethical behavior. Your use of the term “retarded” as a negative is beyond politically incorrect, it’s abhorrent and offensive to those of us with family or friends who are in fact developmentally challenged. Clearly you’re not trying to win people over with an exchange of ideas… you want to bludgeon them with slander, pejoratives and insults. I hope you’ll civilize your interactions for those who will subject themselves to this.

The truth of bullying by Beall, Carol Gambell -from beginning with till today- is alive and well.
I know this article is archived, the same tactics are used. I know really good people that have been slandered and lied about and myself now as well.
When these people cannot win an argument on merit – and for liberal reason of the Common Good – disent must be squashed regardless the truth and consequences.